A number of tools have heretofore been developed for tightening fence wire, particularly barbed wire, while it remains in place on fence posts. However, as fence maintenance tools must often be carried considerable distances by a walking fence worker, the work of carrying such tools along has generally outweighed their usefulness, especially if they be bulky or have limited application.
Wire crimping tools are known to be expedient for tightening short lengths and short sections of fastened fence wire. It is also known that a series of alternate kinks of small amplitude can leave a fence wire tighter than a single deeper one. U.S. Pat. No. 3,831,642 issued to Grecott is for a wire crimping tool which simultaneously makes a series of small crimps. U.S. Pat. No. 2,087,125 to Smith, et al., describes a similar device. The force required to crimp wire varies approximately as the square of the depth of the crimp while the mechanical advantage of the Grecott and Smith, et al., tools remains constant as the crimp deepens. Grecott and Smith, et al., employ single levers, thereby limiting the mechanical advantage and usefulness of their tools. A tool with increased mechanical advantage would be used not merely to restore slack wire to moderate tension, but to higher tension which requires making a more limited number of kinks simultaneously and avoiding bending wire too far out of the line of tension.
Thus, there presently exists a need for a tool sized to be easily carried in a bucket with other small tools and supplies, yet is both a wire crimper and wire cutter, with superior mechanical advantage.